Public Policy

5 stage model

Analytical device used by researchers to study policy; noy a literal description of policy making process

Harold Lasswell

Creation of a policy science that would focus explicitly on what governments do rather than how they are organized

Behavioralism

Focus on political the political behavior of individuals and groups throughout society

Public Policies

International courses of action designed by government bodies and officials to accomplish a specific goal or objective

Policy outputs

What governments do to implement or enforce policy

Policy outcomes

What the public policies produces

5 stages of policy making

Agenda setting, policy formulation, decision making, policy implementation, and policy evaluation

Institutional agenda

Issues that are the focus of policy making; taken from much larger systemic agenda

Convergence thesis

As countries industrialize, they develop similar policy concerns

Outside initiation model

Organized groups interest groups attempt to raise the profile of an issue on the systemic agenda

Inside initiation model

Influential interest groups seek to pressure the government to address particular concerns without expanding the visibility of the debate on the systemic agenda

Mobilization model

Describes situations in which government constituents the group interested in agenda setting

Consolidation model

The government places an issue on the institutional agenda that already is visible on the systemic agenda

Iron triangle

Refers to a policy subsector controlled by the relevant bureaucratic agencies, the relevant legislative committees, and the major interest groups dedicated to that policy area

Issue network

Refers to situations in which a mix of government and non-government actors actively involved in policy formulation is much more flexible over time; competing term to iron triangle

Policy network

A map detailing the different actors who typically participate actively in a given policy area, and in particular, the nature of the relationship between government and non-government participants

Rational decision making model

Primary conceptualization of decision making; prescribes a path to sound decisions rather than from an attempt to describe reality

pareto optimality

States that at least one person must be made better off while making no one worse off

Kaldor criterion

A policy must provide more benefits than costs to society as a whole

Satisficing decision making

Sets basic guidelines for a decision and then trying to meet them

Incremental decision making model

Policy options under consideration need not be from an exhaustive list but rather a short list varying only incrementally from the status quo

Garbage can decision making model

Optimizing adjustment decision making model

Decision makers do not consider widely divergent options but are willing to consider fairly significant changes from the status quo

Direct government instruments

Type of policy instruments in which the government acts directly though regulation, the provision of services, or the operation of state-owned enterprises

Market instruments

Type of policy instrument ranging from deregulation to incentives intended to motivate certain behaviors within a largely free market

Voluntary instruments

Type of policy instrument where governments mobilize their powers of persuasion to convince the public to address public policy concerns at home or in their local communities

Mixed instruments

Public policy instrument in which the three other instruments are combined or mixed

Top down implementation

The resources dedicated to an agency, its organizational structure and the goals adopted by the agency are crucial to its success

Bottom up implementation

Principle-agent model

The principle may have one vision of policy implementation but cannot carry it out without the cooperation of many individual agents to whom specific responsibilities have been delegated

Administrative evaluation

Policy evaluation conducted by the government itself

Judicial evaluation

Policy evaluation conducted by the courts in response to a particular legal complaint against the program

Political evaluation

Policy evaluation by the tracking of public opinion polls and election results